Proof
by kashudoreineko
Summary: This was written for the Makin' Lemonaide week 19 challenge How do you prove you love someone.


Proof

DISC: I do not own Hana Yori Dango or its characters. If I did, I wouldn't have lasted 36 volumes, or I would have died of sleeplessness while worrying about the characters for that long.

WARNING: If you haven't read all 36 volumes of HYD, you'll find the conclusion "spoiled" here, since this takes place after the 36 volumes. Not that there wasn't plenty of hints about pairings in the book, and not that it's not worth reading even supposing you knew what happened in the end. But if you do think you'll read it, and you haven't yet, I warn you that reading the following story might make you a little more relaxed than I was while reading through the scanlations & translations on line. I read it all in less than 4 days and three nights, and slept very little - because I really worried about the characters that much. Yes, I do know that they're just characters in a story. But they're really intriguing ones. So... anyway... I think that's enough of a spoiler warning space, and now on to the fic.

Every day I get up, make coffee. My mom makes breakfast. It's usually just rice. That's all we can afford.

I wasn't sure how I'd adjust to having the whole family in one apartment again, but it's good. Having those you love nearby is good. Plus, it's actually less worrisome when I know I can keep an eye on them.

It's actually kind of odd, but I think they grew up a bit while they were away. Mom, Dad, Susumu, they all have jobs. I'm not the only one being responsible now. Of course, Dad still gets suckered in and loses a lot of money on get-rich-quick schemes. But with the rest of us bringing our wages in regularly, we had enough to pay for Eitoku for one last year for me, and to send Susumu to high school, too.

It's kind of weird to think that I graduated two years ago now. Susumu is graduating tomorrow. I'm really proud of him. He did so well at school. And when he took entrance exams he scored so high that he actually got a scholarship. Next year, we'll be attending university together.

Yeah, I'm in college. That's why all four of us still need to work so hard. But I did get a "scholarship", too. If that's what you want to call it. I personally call it the Shigeru & Sakurako grounding fund.

One of the things I learned in high school is that not all rich people are snobs.

When it came time to graduate, I announced that it was time for me to get a full time job - no more escaping the reality of my family's financial desperation by hiding in school. I actually left Eitoku and got a full time job as a waitress at a family restaurant. I was making pretty good wages there, and because I'm not pretty or anything, I never had any crazy patrons flirting with me. Which was good.

But when I left Eitoku, it seems that... Well, I was working so many hours, that I didn't get the chance to see Shigeru or Sakurako more than once a month. And one day, while I was working the lunch shift, I got a table that requested me as their waitress. It turns out it was Shigeru's parents and Sakurako's grandmother.

They'd been cutting classes. A lot. Sakurako was showing Shigeru to all the night clubs, and they were getting... well, pretty out of control. Sakurako tends to rely on her pretty face to get her out of anything, and Shigeru just doesn't think things through because... Well, because she's Shigeru and that's what she does.

So, the adults all met up to discuss what to do about it, and they decided I was the solution. They had come to this common restaurant to ask me to go back to Eitoku, to university. For some reason, they seemed to think I was a calming influence on the girls. I didn't understand it. But they swore that both the girls had calmed down so much, and gotten better grades during the time that I hung out with them. They said that they wanted to offer me a scholarship, based on Sakurako and Shigeru's grades. If their grades fell below a certain point, they'd stop the scholarship.

"How the hell am I supposed to control their grades?" I asked, completed befuddled. They told me that they were sure that as long as I was around that it shouldn't be a problem. When I told them I thought they were certifiable, they begged. Said that I should look at it as investing in the future of Japan. Their kids. I told them I'd think about it.

Part of me didn't want to go back. Not without Doumyouji.

The last year of high school was more difficult than any of the others. The F3 were still on campus, and insisted on meeting me for lunch several days a week. It surprised me, but I guess I'm like a fungus - I grow on people. Weird as that may be. But without Doumyouji... The girls still gave me crap about hanging out with them, but whatever. That wasn't the difficult part.

What was difficult - the thing that is still so difficult - is that Doumyouji isn't here.

It hurts to not see him. It's like when someone gets a limb amputated. They still feel like it's there. It should be there. It was there before. Why isn't it there? Why isn't he here?

I know why, though.

Eventually, my brother was the one who made my decision clear for me. He said, "So, you're saying that you miss him LESS when you're alone rather than hanging around with your friends and you can talk about him? Less when you have no one to remind you how much he loves you? Less than when you can share your memories of him to make him pop up in your mind more?" Sometimes, I'm a complete idiot.

So now, I'm at the university. I take classes with Shigeru and Sakurako. There's no pressure for me to get good grades. But it's a handful keeping them in line.

Well, it was a handful... Until Sakurako started dating Kazuya. I don't even really know how that happened. But they're pretty cute now, and she's studying a lot more seriously. She knows she's going to have to help Kazuya take over his family's business. And to help him from appearing like a "commoner." Apparently, the consensus is that I'm more likely to win a rematch for Teen of Japan than Kazuya is to EVER fit in with the high class. But Sakurako is determined to remake him. She says, "If I can become this beautiful, there's hope for anyone."

I love her.

So I go to school, and I work part time, and I hang out with my friends and talk about Doumyouji. And I wait.

Only one year to go.

In my room, I have a box. It's a wooden box with a lock - it looks like a mini-pirate's chest. The silver key is on a chain around my neck. Tsubaki gave me the box as a graduation present. It is the only possession I have that I would never want to lose. In it, are the Saturn necklace that Doumyouji gave me, and so many letters that I can barely close the lid anymore.

They're all I have of him for one more year.

Kaede won't let him come back to Japan at all until that time. And while I could go to see him, I know that if I go there, I won't be able to leave.

So instead, I write to him, and he writes to me. And he calls me once a month. Only once a month. So that Kaede doesn't pitch a fit. But that night, my parents always take my brother for a long walk, so that I have the apartment to myself to talk to him.

I never tell him how much it hurts to be apart from him. I never tell him that every day that I don't get a letter from him, the further I get from his last call, the more I ache. And he never says that either. But I do tell him I love him. And he tells me.

We don't talk on the phone about the things that we talk about in our letters. Okay, some of our letters are just basic, here's what's going on in my life letters. But there are some...

We never got the chance... Either I was too scared, or someone interrupted, or I fell in a pool and got sick. And there are so many nights when I just lie awake in bed and think about what it felt like to have him touching me. I remember the intense look in his eyes, and I'm no longer frightened remembering it. I want to see it. I want it so much. His lips on mine. Soft, and then fierce. The way it feels when he crushes me to him like he's afraid I might disappear.

So sometimes, when I write to him, I tell him that I'm not afraid any longer. I tell him how much I want to feel him holding me. And I promise him that if he comes back to me... Usually I say when, but sometimes I slip and say if. I promise him that I'm his and only his, and that I will wait as long as it takes for him to come and take me - and then... then I'll give him anything. Everything. God, I want to feel him touching me again.

I want to SEE him again.

Hanazawa Rui has been staying in New York for the past year, off and on. He's been working for his family's company. And he always sees Doumyouji when he's there. When he comes back, he tells me how he looks, how he's doing. He's told me that the two of us are funny. That he can always tell when it's the middle of the month with either of us, because we start looking frayed and depressed. But then, as we get closer to the end of the month, he says, we get focused - excited, like there's something to look forward to. And for the first two weeks after we hear each other's voice, we're calmer and happier.

Hanazawa Rui says that if I ever decide to give up on Doumyouji, that he's still in love with me. I always scowl at him and he laughs and tells me that he hopes someday he'll find the girl he's destined for like Doumyouji did.

I don't know if I'm destined to be with Doumyouji. But I do know I'm determined.

God, I love him so much.

One more year. Just one more year.

Even if it was 50 more, I'd still wait for him.

I don't have a choice anymore. I love him.

X

Three years down. One to go.

She's all the way on the other side of the world.

I feel like everything I've done for three years has been swabbed in cotton - I'm numb without her. (AN: That's swathed, baka!)

I don't know what's going to happen in a year, exactly. But I've been positioning myself well in the company. I've been working hard. I'm proving that I am worthy of running this company. And after four years of being in charge, when I finally go back, when I finally marry her, no one will care but my mother.

And I don't care what she thinks anymore. I run this company now.

Tama said that Mother told Tsubaki that after four years of running the company, if I still wanted Makino that she wouldn't do anything to stop it. I'm not willing to bet anything on that. It's a nice thought, but if wishes were birds, commoners would fly.

It's so strange. On one hand, I don't know how I've survived this long away from her. I feel like someone has cut out one of my internal organs - something this important isn't supposed to be missing. But on the other hand, this is the easiest thing I've ever done.

She's waiting for me. And if all I have to do to have her by my side for the rest of my life is get through the next year, then that's all there is to it.

I'd follow her to hell and drag her back kicking and screaming if I had to.

She's the only thing in my entire life...

I don't know that I ever HAD a life before her.

She is my life.

-FIN-


End file.
